Chrissy Teigen Is a Member of the Mile-High Club

From bikinis to red-carpet gowns, Chrissy Teigen makes sexy look easy. But sexiness comes from within ... and loving life. Spend a night at home with the model who eats what she wants, says what she thinks, and never takes anything too seriously, including herself.

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From bikinis to red-carpet gowns, Chrissy Teigen makes sexy look easy. But sexiness comes from within … and loving life. Spend a night at home with the model who eats what she wants, says what she thinks, and never takes anything too seriously, including herself.

Bouncing around her open kitchen in her spacious midcentury modern home, Chrissy Teigen stirs Tom Yum Gai chicken soup, drops pork and vegetable egg rolls into a sizzling wok, and checks on the garlic pork ribs roasting in the oven. Overseeing the traditional Thai meal is her mother, who moved to Los Angeles from Thailand a year ago with Teigen's father. Until recently the couple had lived with their daughter and her husband, R & B icon John Legend. "If we weren't making Thai food, I would be doing all the cooking," Teigen says, bending over a pot and inhaling deeply. "I'll come in from a long flight and go straight to the grocery store. I love cooking for my man. John is very successful, so people sometimes think that I am mooching off him. But we take care of each other in different ways."

The 28-year-old Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue cover star — whose new MTV show, Snack-Off, premieres in July — is perfectly on-trend in a sleeveless chiffon top, David Lerner leggings, and knee-high Givenchy boots. She shows off some piercings she had done earlier in the day: five delicate diamond studs and rose-gold accents circling her lobe and upper ear. Then she offers me a glass of wine as we watch the indulgent meal come together. "I always get to eat what I want, because if I don't, I go insane," she says. "If you're going to choose to do something like the Paleo Diet, then you choose not to enjoy your nights out."

No one would ever accuse Teigen of not enjoying herself. That's evident from her hilariously blunt Twitter account and her food blog, So Delushious, where she's posted F-bomb-laden recipes, retorts to her haters, romantic honeymoon photos, and at least one naked selfie of her drinking in the bathtub. "I have way more female followers than I do men," she reveals. "Men are very tough, very critical of me. I think they expect you to basically just be a picture. They don't want to hear you speak. Women, I love. It's amazing to me, because I am a swimsuit model; I'm half-naked. I just love the fact that women love me, and it makes me love them so much back."

While dinner is cooking, she leads me into her bedroom, a Zen lair with a low, king-size bed piled with pillows and a wall of windows overlooking her backyard. Close on her heels are two portly bulldogs, Pooey and Puddy, and a French bulldog, Pippa. Still wearing her boots, Teigen plops onto her bed and shrugs as Puddy climbs right up beside her, settling onto the pillows and whining at her flat-screen TV. "Sorry, he gets very emotional over the Sarah McLachlan commercials," she jokes.

It is Teigen's fun and funny personality that first attracted Legend back in 2006, when Teigen, then 21 and working as a catalog model, was cast in a music video for his hit single, "Stereo." "Please don't look it up on YouTube!" she cries. "I was doing this fake model-y dancing with the most dead eyes you've ever seen in a human." Regardless, she made an impression off-camera. "I walked into John's dressing room to meet him, and he was ironing in his underwear," she recalls. "I said, 'You do your own ironing!?' He said, 'Of course I do.' I gave him a hug."

After chatting throughout the 14-hour shoot, the two feasted on In-N-Out burgers later that night at his hotel. "I'm not going to lie. We hooked up," she admits, but then Legend headed out on tour. She spent the next year texting and talking to him on the phone, trying to ignore pictures of him on red carpets with other women on his arm. "I let him be himself for a while," she says. "The worst thing you can do is try to lock someone like that down early on, then have them think, There's so much more out there. I played it cool for a long time. Never once did I ask, 'What are we?' Marriage was never my goal, because I've never been very traditional. I was just happy to be with him."

She still is. "One of the coolest things is how supportive and happy and proud he is of my success lately," she says. "I'm with someone who is totally secure in himself. He's not trying to be anything other than what he is. The confidence he has brings it to me." That extends to their sex life, which is fueled by "good communication and a glass of wine," she says. "We're by no means freaky-deaky, but let's just say, we're open to things. We're very okay with PDA. When we go to a restaurant, he loves when I wear a dress, so he can do some upper-thigh rubbing. I would love to see more husbands and wives making out!" After texting her husband to make sure it's okay ("It's very rare I would ask his [permission] for anything"), she reveals the craziest place they've had sex: "We were on our way to Thailand to see my parents, flying commercial first-class. We were under a blanket. We weren't even in one of those pod things. I feel like we should get a trophy for that." Clutching her forehead, she says, "Mom and Dad are going to nail me for this!"

Just as Teigen's mother is calling us to dinner, Legend walks through the door. Dropping a duffel bag onto the floor, he gathers his wife into his arms and gives her a warm kiss. She claps a hand to her ear and winces as he grazes her fresh piercings. "What do you think?" she asks.

The family gathers around the kitchen island, chatting about their plans — Teigen and Legend are headed to Ohio that night for his mother's 60th birthday — while enjoying the best Thai food I've ever eaten. Teigen takes none of it for granted. "I got so lucky that I met Brooklyn Decker and she [hooked me up with] Sports Illustrated," she says. "I got so lucky that I met John, who propelled my career. I'm not delusional: that definitely helped. But I don't want to be thought of as just John's wife, so I'm trying to make a name without it, which is hard in its own way." Licking her fingers, she finishes the last of the ribs and brings her dish to the sink. "Even three years ago, I never dreamed of this life," she says, smiling at her husband and the dogs who are sitting at her feet, waiting for scraps to drop. "It's unreal."

For even more with Chrissy Teigen, pick up the new issue on newsstands May 6.

BONUS: Did you know you can get your monthly issue of Cosmo on your e-reader? It's the same issue you'd buy on the newsstand, but with a few extra bells 'n' whistles like videos and special graphics, plus special bonus articles you can't get anywhere else.